Parish Council Response to 2nd Planning Application (South of Aspen Way)

As promised in an earlier post, below is the Parish Council’s response to the second planning application for land south of Aspen Way, which was published in May. More information about this can be found in our earlier post about the application here.

The Parish Council’s response:

Having read through the information provided for the Erection of 13 no. dwellings (APPLICATION NO:
23/00348/MFUL), taken consultation from residents within the Parish and referenced the plans against
the recent parish survey, the Parish Council has significant concerns.
The Parish Council is extremely concerned that a site that was originally approved in outline as one site
to be developed, has now turned into two applications/schemes, which do not complement each other in
any way, shape or form. A site which was to be ‘the gateway to Slingsby’ is fast turning into Cinderella’s
carriage at midnight!
Can the planning authority confirm that this split site approach is able to be taken forward?

• The Parish Council along with all residents consulted have serious concern regarding the phased
  approach of development. The initial planning application (outline approval 18/00686/MOUT dated
  12.03.2020) assumed that the whole site would be developed as one phase and as such, the Parish
  Council had no objections. This application could be developed on a different timescale to the other
  application by a different developer. The new application makes no reference to the integration or
  timescales of the second phase of development. This raises several significant issues regarding the
  initial development and the completion of landscaping, utilities etc as well as the visual impact of an
  unfinished or incomplete site. Without guarantees that the whole site will be developed to a satisfactory
  standard in a timely manner, it is impossible to give the support to any part thereof.
• The affordable housing provision has been placed together. To achieve better social cohesion,
  dispersing the affordable housing across the whole of the site would be much preferable.
• In the design and access statement, it references a local farm shop. Slingsby does not have a farm
  shop and any development would add greater strain to the limited resources and amenities that do exist. Similarly, the local village school is currently at capacity and some children living in the parish do not have places at Slingsby school. Additional family homes at the proposed number would add even greater strain and competition for limited places.
• The village has ongoing issue with surface water flooding and the addition of significant number of
  houses at the elevated south end of the village is likely to have increased surface flooding impacts on the lower lying areas of the village, predominantly Railway Street. The Ryedale District Plan 2013 page 109, section 6 referencing utilities in service villages identified that Slingsby had ‘no current capacity’ and ‘upgrading will be required’ with respect to sewers.
• The Parish Council has a particular concern regarding the lack of detail over the future management
  and liability of the green spaces, trees and hedges created by both applications. There is little reference
  to the process by which existing trees and hedges need regular maintenance, and the new landscaping
  will be managed, and maintained. If it is to come under a management company with shared
  responsibility lying with the new residents, full planning, risk assessment and work plans (including
  liability and insurance details) should be defined.
• There are also strong concerns from within the village as to the increased stress on already busy roads
  and the amount of traffic more houses will bring. Adding another access point to potentially later change to a pedestrian/cycle route will allow additional traffic further into Aspen Way increasing unnecessarily quiet cul de sac. The Balk is a relatively narrow road, which takes the majority of the traffic in and out of the village, including all heavy goods and agricultural vehicles. A positive step for the developers would have been to address this issue and look at ways of maximising the flow of traffic through the Balk.
• Finally, the parish council would like to see a clearer awareness of and mitigation strategy for the buried
  archaeology likely to be encountered on the site. The Balk is located within a highly sensitive
  archaeological area, between two large, nationally important scheduled areas (NHLE Iron Age barrow
  cemetery to the east and NHLE 1004178 Slingsby Castle, to the west). In particular, the site lies along
  the line of the Iron Age trackway and barrow cemetery to the east, as identified by Historic England’s
  Howardian Hills Aerial Mapping project (HE NMP p.15) fig.1. The trackway lies directly in the path of the
  proposed development, yet no mention is made of its significance in the Design and Access Statement
  and there are no details of the findings made during preliminary explorations of the site last year to mirror the ecology reports submitted as part of this reserved matters application. We note that Historic England as a Statutory Consultee has expressed concerns about the absence of clear reference to
  archaeological mitigation under the terms of the NPPF (para 194) and the Listed Buildings and
  Conservation Areas Act (1990) 72(1) and 38(6) and would repeat their request for reassurance that the
  original archaeological conditions apply and will be adhered to in the revised proposals.
  We ask the Planning Authority to take our concerns about a two-site approach very seriously as this
  could have a long-lasting effect on the visual amenity of Slingsby along with the residents who will have
  to live through a two scheme build.
  

Slingsby, South Holme and Fryton Parish Council